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crime

Swimming Pool * François Ozon * 2003

I recently reviewed Ozon’s previous film “8 Femmes”. It is funny that Ozon took the same idea again, but worked it out totally differently. “Swimming Pool” again is an old fashioned detective, but this time no light musical. An English writer goes to the house in France of her publisher to find out that also her publishers never-mentioned French daughter uses it to enjoy herself and her lovers. Sarah first is extremely irritated by Julies behaviour, but later gets intrigued by her and starts writing about Julie.

The film is minimal and slow and really balances on the border between boredom and gripping, without bending too much towards the first. Well done I must say, but the end of the film is really not what Ozon should have done. All the film there is nothing wrong, but still Ozon wanted a few changes of plot which he puts in the last three minutes. Too bad. All in all a nice film, but I suggest you wait until it is out on video. Strange by the way, “Swimming Pool” had its Dutch premiere last week, while it played in Belgium two months ago.

The Strange Case of Sherlock Holmes & Arthur Conan Doyle * David Pirie * 2005

The Britisch channel BBC keeps coming up with expensive and ambitious TV projects. Recently a result of them is this TV film with a long title. As you will understand from the title, this film is about the famous inspector Sherlock Holmes and it’s author Arthur Conan Doyle (1859-1930). Doyle is getting sick and tired of Sherlock Holmes and lets him die. The audience and critics react fiercely. Doyle proves more productive in writing than ever but the public keeps longing for Holmes. Doyle’s publisher suggests a biography of the writer in the ‘Sherlock Holmes style’. So a man comes to Doyle asking quesions about his past, his motives, etc. in order to found out if events in Doyle’s life have shaped the stories of Sherlock Holmes.
The film is enjoyable, probably especially for people who know the stories of Sherlock Holmes (I don’t). If you know abut the BBC TV-film projects, you can easily compare this one with most of the others regarding quality in writing, acting, recording, etc.: very good. It is a good thing that a public channel has the money to make something different from the usual Hollywood films. You will have to see them on TV, but he, you can’t have everything!

Snatch * Guy Ritchie * 2000

This is the third film of Guy Ritchie and comes some time after the nice, but not as funny “Lock Stock And Two Smoking Barrels”. A great crime-comedy with a magnificent role of Brad Pitt as boxing gipsie (“pikey”). Two maffioso involved in illegal boxing-games want to buy a caravan from gipsie Pitt who sells them a wreck that doesn’t even survive the trip out of the gipsie camp. Boxer Bullet Tooth and Pitt will make things up in a fight and the small Pitt knocks-out Bullet Tooth with just one hit. BT was supposed to have a fight in the next night and eventually they pursuade Mickey (Pitt) to replace him. However Mickey is supposed to go down in round four, he knocks-out his opponent with one blow, which meant a lot of problems for some high-ranked criminals.

Of course there is more about the movie and these few lines are just the first part, but I suggest that you just go and see this movie yourself. It is pretty violent at times and especially… funny. Tarantino humour, strange dialogues and an unintelligible Pitt make “Snatch” an instant classic.

It is said that the film “Sexy Beast” (the debut of Jonathan Glazer with Ben Kingsley as main character) is equally brilliant and in the same style (crime-comedy). We Europeans are set for 11 October for that one, I don’t know about the USA). (reviewed 18/11/01)

I just saw the film again after too many years. “Snatch” DID become the instant classic that I mentioned. It was (one of the) first crime-comedies with ‘nouvelle violence’ humour and cut-up stories that are still popular, but “Snatch” has certainly stood the course of time. (jan 09)

Sexy Beast * Jonathan Glazer * 2000

Gal (Ray Winstone) is an ex criminal from the UK who lives out his retirement of his stolen fortune in Spain with his wife and a befriended couple. Then they get a phonecall from Don Logan (played by Ben Kingsley best known for playing Gandhi) about a cracking for which he wanted to ask Gal. The friends already know that the terrible Don is not going to take “no” for an answer and when Logan even comes over to ask Gal personally, stress and nervousnous get grip of the friends. When he arrived, Gal tries to tell Logan a couple of times that he isn’t interested, but indeed Logan doesn’t take “no” for an answer which results in some serious collisions. Eventually Gal does go to London, but since Logan is dead, he has another problem.

“Sexy Beast” is the first film of Jonathan Glazer and I read about it quite some time ago. The original plans were to release it only on video in Europe, but when the film was a big success in the States and European critics wrote ravingly about it, it was anounced for European cinemas. Eventually this turned out (for me) only 5 cinemas in the Netherlands (closest at 100 km) and one in Belgium (140 km). DAMN! Then (big surprise) there was one play in my hometown! Bad news, one time, saturdaynight 00:00 (12 am)…
But so I went. The film is often compared to “Snatch”, but I don’t entirely agree with that. Okay, both are crime-films, “Snatch” is more funny, but also “Sexy Beast” has some grim humour. A big difference lays in the essembly (?) of the films. “Snatch” is more like one film without much flash-backs, etc., “Sexy Beast” does have flash-backs, but more in a dark way, even reminding of David Lynch’s “Lost Highway” sometimes. Further: strange camery-positions, great special effects and wonderfull acting. Sometimes “Sexy Beast” is completely brilliant, but at other times not so. Overall I liked the film, but I don’t think it is as brilliant as some people say.

Resurrection * Russell Mulcahy * 1999

A friends project it seems. Christopher Lambert (Highlander, etc.) writes the story for a film and asks Mulcahy (Highlander, etc.) to direct it. “Ressurection” proves to be a “Se7en” copy.

Prudhomme (Lambert in the main part of his own film) is a police officer investigating a series of gruesome murders. During the investigation he is contacted by the killer and gets too deeply involved in the case of events. The killer proves to have an agenda based on his strict Christian faith. The film is pretty grim, the killings are shown very gruesome and Prudhomme brakes his mind over the symbolism of the killings. Nothing we haven’t seen before. Also “Resurrection” isn’t as cleverly written as “Se7en” (even though I had figured that one out before the end), so there are no real surprises. Overall an amusing film, but with a bit too high pretentions.

Nueve Reinas * Fabián Bielinsky * 2000

nine queens

“For people who like Memento and Amores Perros” the cover of my rental version said. Well, the story is much more like Christopher Nolans (of Memento) older film “Following”. Anyway, “Nine Queens” is about two small time crooks who accidentally run into eachother and decide to work together for one day. They filch some peoples money and then get a bigger job than they are used to: selling nine very expensive stamps. The whole film you are made to wonder who is fooling who, which is the whole idea of the film so I won’t say anything more. Nice film. <3>

The Negotiator – F. Gary Gray (1998)

I don’t watch popular Hollywood action films very often and after watching “The Negotiator” I remember why. The promising cast with Samuel L. Jackson, Kevin Spacey, David Morse, J.T. Walsh, etc. was no guarantee for an enjoyable film. The story is standard: ‘negotiator’ Jackson is set up by his colleagues for missing money and the murder of his partner. Normally trying to talk hostage-takers out of their actions, Jackson takes people into hostage himself to prove his innocence. This does not go as planned, which is an opportunaty for some action-scenes. Spacey is called in to talk Jackson out of his actions, he develops a sympathy for Jackson’s situation and after an ‘surprising’ scene, all ends well. Not the most entertaining film. Not that the acting is bad, but the story and the way things are worked out are too 15-in-a-dozen.

Monroe: Class of ’76 * Ashley Pearce * 2005

This is a film in two parts, or otherwise, a miniseries with two one hour episodes. Robert Carlyle is Tom Monroe. When investigation the apparent suicide of a man, he runs into strange events that happened in the past in a small village. Those events have their results still. “Class of ’76” is a nice ‘supernatural thriller’. Fortunately not like “Millenium”, “Charmed” or “Medium”, but more with a suggestive extra layer, such as in some X-Files. The atmosphere goes from just a crime film to very dense and dark horrorish scenes. The story is not too hard to figure out, so I won’t say too much about it. The first 105 minutes are really well, the finale is rather poor unfortunately. These series are available on DVD, so no reason for not reviewing them (I saw them on the Belgian public television).

Mindhunters * Renny Harlin * 2004

At a ‘three DVDs for E 15,-‘ action I had to pick a third film from a variety of crap, ‘Intollerable Cruelty’ and this film which I didn’t know. I picked ‘Mindhunters’.
A group of FBI-profilers-trainees are dropped on an island for their final task. They have to solve a murder case, but instead get killed themselves one by one. ‘Mindhunters’ is supposed to be a grim, psychological thriller, a variation on the ‘find the serial killer’ theme. In a way it is, but the story isn’t too interesting, the film isn’t too special and the result is disappointing.

Memento * Christopher Nolan * 2000

A brilliant movie about a guy who has been in a terrible accident in which he lost both his short-term memory and his girlfriend. Because of the lack of his memory, he makes pictures of important things he encounters on the search for the murderers of his girlfriend. Clues are written on papers and important clues tattood on his body. “Memento” is magnificently told backwards, adding to the disability of the main character. You will see a scene and when it ends, you will get the scene of what happened before what you just saw. It sure takes the whole movie to figure it out and even afterwards you will have to discuss it with people to fully comprehend “Memento”. The great atmosphere, shooting in black and white, the disturbing images of Guy Pearce with his body full of texts and the idea that things are entirely different from what the main character things, make this movie one of the best that I saw in the last year.